He scanned the sky as he spoke. The heavy overcast was lightening, and the wandering rain-ghosts had retreated to make way for drizzle. Rivulets snaked across the concrete quad from one puddle to another, eventually over-brimming into a furrow that widened and deepened into a trench entering a conduit to a ditch or storm sewer somewhere off the campus.
'Name a few tools,' I said.
He grinned. 'Pliers. Wrench. Screwdriver. OK?'
'OK,' I answered. 'More.'
His eyes contemplated the drizzle, came back to stare at the wet walls of the kiosk, settled on his haversack, and stayed. I followed his glance. A 4-inch long, candy-striped, enamel coated safety pin fastened down the flap of its side pocket.
'Safety pin,' he chuckled. 'Tool, right?'
'Could be. How would you get ready to describe it?'
He stared at me, his face gone blank. 'How 'to get ready' to describe a safety pin? What's this 'get ready' bit? It's just a safety pin. You're kiddin'.'
'The heck I am,' I said. 'You just called it a 'tool'. If you're going to describe it, know enough about it to find the words for the job. Words are also tools, whether they describe other tools, or tornadoes, toys, teeth, trees, or tractors.
'Start with thinking about the readers; will they be in an outfit that makes specialized equipment to fabricate safety pins; will it be a safety pin huckster contacting customers by phone, personal contact, or letter, or how about some kid's mom up-country in an underdeveloped country who never even heard about Velcro flaps on diapers, if she ever heard of diapers at all. Just assume the woman lives in a village where no one ever heard of safety pins until a K-Mart opened up alongside the town rice paddy. What I'm gettin' at is: who's the information for? How much do they really need to know in order to do what they want with the thing?'